30 Before 30: September '12

I love candy corn.  I have to be careful because I can eat a whole bag of it by myself .   I saw these guys at the grocery store, bring on October!

Another month has flown by and I'm here wondering what I've accomplished on my 30 before 30 list.  This month I've decided to list all of the things I've accomplished first and then list all of the things I am currently working on and finally the things I haven't started.  Here we go!

Accomplished:

*12. Start dying yarn to sell

*15. Crochet a doily throw

*17. Sew a pair of jeans

*18. Grow Veggies in the Apartment

*19. Learn to can

*21. Go fruit picking

*23. See Eve 6 again

In Progress:

-2. Learn to duck dive (This will be put on hold till our trip to Oz in December.)

-3. Get Apartment in Order (I'm thinking about inviting some friends over for dinner to light a fire under my bum to get this goal moving.)

-5. Turn my Etsy into a source of Income

-8. Pay down student loan by 6,000

-26. Learn more about photography/my camera

-27. Make a me made wardrobe/ stop buying clothes

 To Do:

1. Go on Honeymoon

4. Compete in a Surf Comp at the Shore

6. Open a Roth IRA ( I should just do this.  It will take all of one hour to complete.)

7. Get Health Insurance

9. Sew a “Chanel” inspired jacket

10. Go to London again

11. Publish a book of knitting patterns

13. Learn to cook tofu well

14. Design Cable Heart Cardi

16. Sew a quilt

20. Knit a circular yoke sweater

22. Go on a road trip with a good friend

24. Brew beer

25. Start Vlogging

28. Go to Vogue Knitting

29. Go to Maryland sheep and wool

30. Get a new tattoo

Looking at these lists I have to remember that I am only 6 months into my 30 before 30 and I've accomplished 7 of my 30 goals.  That's about a goal a month and that works out pretty well in the grand scheme of things.  The goals that are in progress are all goals that will take me a while to accomplish, but It's nice to see that they are getting done.  What's interesting about those goals is that they all will take some time. A great example of that is my student loan.  I wish I had $6,000 to drop on one payment, but that's not going to happen unless I some how come into a lot of money at once.  I must be content paying my loan the old fashioned way, one payment at a time.  Although I am paying extra every month and am ahead of my payments by 3 months I'm hoping that this will all add up to me being debt free sooner than later.  

My to accomplish list is long, but a lot of those goals are just a matter of time and energy, like the sweater and the cable design.  I just have to plan ahead, hunker down and get it done.  I'm sure in 30 months I'll be able to check all the boxes on my goals.  

30 Before 30: August 2012 Update & Look Ahead

August is drawing to a close, which means that summer is coming to it's last days.  I haven't progress very much on my 30 before 30, but I'm still plugging away.  I am still trying to learn to duck dive, but soon that will have to wait till we travel to Oz.  There is a huge possibility that I will have health insurance soon.  Our apartment is becoming less and less cluttered at we purge the things we don't needs and find better solutions to storing what we do have.  I have been canning all summer and plan on continuing into the fall with tomatoes, peach butter, and apple butter.  My summer adventures will draw to a close with one last bang, a Bruce Springsteen concert in Philly.  

What I find truly exciting isn't accomplishing my list or even my first summer in Philly; tt is my return to working in theatre.  Has is been easy, no.  Has it been busy, yes.  Is it what I've been missing, yes.  In looking to the fall I expect to be busy, I expect to have long days, but I expect to be in my element and happy about those long hours.  This fall will be my trial by fire, a test I intend to pass.  It only took six years out of college for me to realize that I had made the right decision at 18 picking Theatre Arts as my major.  This is where I should be, and I expect there to be even more, even better things to come.  

30 before 30: July '12 Update

This month has had a lot of exciting changes going happening and for some reasons I haven't been accomplishing a lot on my list.  I really shouldn't say that I just haven't completed anything on my list lately.  However I am still working on my duck diving and am having fun playing with my camera's settings.  I also blogged recently about de-clutetring the apartment which is part of a long term plan to get the apartment in order.  We have gusts visiting in the next few weekends, so I will be de-clutter and cleaning like crazy.

My most recent surf pic.  Simon is starting to get the hang of taking action shots, but I still haven't figured out how to really duck dive.  I've been faux duck diving where I stand in the water and push my board under the water, so far it's better than just diving under the wave and letting my board do what ever it wants. 

30 Before 30 June '12 Update

It's that time again, a 30 before 30 Update and I must say I didn't think I had made much progress this month.  Then I looked back at June and realized I have done a good chunk of things.  Lets start with completed items.

Complete:

18. Grow Veggies in the apartment.  I can successfully say that this has been completed although we will be reaping the benefits for a few more months.  We ate our first tomato and I picked some of the Chard that was ready to put into a pasta dish earlier this month.  We also have a ton of Cucumbers coming in and our green bean plants are going crazy. 

How yummy does that look?  Whole wheat pasta with roasted radishes and turnips with sausage and chard from our window boxes.  

21.  Go fruit picking.  We have done this twice now and just like our little garden giving us yummy produce through the summer we will be doing this through to the fall.  So far we have picked strawberries, blueberries and peaches.  I still want to pick raspberries, blackberries and apples in the fall. 

19. Learn to can.  After strawberry picking I made some strawberry jam and I even tried my hand at water bath canning.  

Here's my jam jars getting a nice boiling bath.  It's so exciting to here the lid pop and know that the can is sealed.  It was so easy to can using a water bath.  I know I won't be able to can low acid items this way, but I'm perfectly fine with that.  

On a somewhat related note I also made my first batch of pickles.  It's a small batch, but I am going to make a few more larger batches of dill pickles and a small batch of bread and butter pickles.  

In Progress:

2. Learn to duck dive.  The last two times we have gone surfing I have been trying my hardest to learn this skill.  I eventually want to be able to surf some slightly bigger waves, but that can't really happen until I learn to duck dive.

5. Turn my Etsy shop into a source of income.  I have officially opened and updated my new shop Alchemy Hour and my pattern sales are the highest they've been since the holiday season. 

26. Learn more about photography/my camera.  I've been having fun learning a bit more about photo editing and while I'm still a beginner it is so much fun to play around.  This is a photo I took when we went to the beach in May.  It was so hazy that you could barely see the top of the Ferris Wheel, I've been playing around with exposure and contrast and different filters.  

30 before 30 May '12 Update

May was a lot more eventful and full of accomplishments than I thought.  I completed more than expected and am having a great month participating in Me Made May '12.

Complete:

Eve 6 Rocking Out in Northern Liberties

23.  See Eve 6 again.  I was super lucky with this one, Eve 6 actually came to Philly to play a free show with Neon Trees.  Of course I went to see them.  They opened for Neon trees, and not that I'm bias or anything, but they put on a way better show than the headliner.  Their new album "Speak in Code" is amazing. 

15. Crocheted Doily Blanket.  I finished the last row of this last night.  I should have been done sooner, but I ran out of yarn with about two feet left to go and had to go get a whole ball of yarn to finish it off.  It's quite large and measures 58 inches in diameter.  I haven't blocked it yet so it might be closer to 60 inches once it's been blocked.  This was a pretty fun project and I will do this again as gifts for very special family and friends, but not this pattern, 36 rows is a lot of doily to crochet.

17. Make a pair of Jeans.  I'm calling this one officially complete.  With a pair of trouser jeans and now a pair of straight leg jeans under my belt (HA!) I feel like a jean master!  This process was amazing and not scary at all, from now on I will probably make all of my jeans.  It just goes to show that it may seem difficult, but if you take it in small manageable pieces it's easy as pie.

In Progress

18. Grow veggies in the apartment.  This is going better than expected and we will at least have one tomato, a few green beans, and a butt load of Swiss Chard (not pictured).  Our cucumber plants are also growing well.  Even though we are definitely going to have some veggies I'm not ticking this one off the list till we actually eat something from our little window garden.

Failed

*27. Make a me made wardrobe/stop buying clothes.  I recently purchased three cotton jersey dresses from Forever 21.  Why I think this is so awful as I bought them right in the middle of Me Made May.  A whole month dedicated to handmade.  What was I thinking?

First off I have to not be so hard on myself, this one is a lot more difficult that it seams.  I haven't really bought new clothes from the mall or a store or online in ages.  I can actually count the times I've bought something new this year, that wasn't bras, on my hand, and one of those times was this instance.  I see that as a big accomplishment, and maybe this set back isn't such a disaster.  I am constantly purging the things that don't fit me or that I just don't wear any more, at the same time making clothes is a process and there are just somethings that I have recently realized that I just don't want to make.  Those things are items made from jersey, like the three dresses I bought, here are my reasons.

I love jersey and there are times when I will sew with it, (to alter a t-shirt, or make a simple skirt).  But good jersey is hard to find, on top of that reasonably priced jersey is hard to find.  Jersey also demands different equipment and tools that wovens do not (ball point needles, ball point pins, ect.).

With this in mind, should I have gone to the thrift store and looked for dresses that were similar to the ones I bought, probably.  If I couldn't have found anything, should I have found something suitable to alter into what I wanted, yuppers.  But the fact remains the same that I bought new ready made clothing, I don't feel guilt, because I know that I won't be buying anything new for a long time, so is this really a fail or just part of the learning process?

Crocheted Doily Blanket

One of my goals for 30 before 30 is to crochet a doily blanket.  I was going to wait to to do this till the fall, but Nancy at Nangellini had the perfect yarn for this project.  By perfect I mean an aqua heather super wash wool.    

I haven't crocheted in awhile and it was fun to get back in the saddle.  While I love knitting garments when it comes to blankets and such I much prefer crochet. 

The first 20 rows were a breeze and were completed quickly, but once I got past that 20th row this project started to take some time.  

Here is a shot of one of the completed pineapples. 

  I have two rows left to crochet and I'll be finished.  As of right now it takes about 30 to 40 min to crochet one row.  That means I have about an hour left of crocheting to go.  

What am I going to do on my Friday night?  Stay home drink a beer and finish crocheting my doily blanket, unless some better offer comes around. 

30 before 30 April '12 Update

At the beginning of the month I shared a list of 30 goals for myself to accomplish before I turn 30.  I have started on some of those goals, some are in progress, some have succeed, and I've even failed at one attempt.

In progress.

#18. Simon and I have planted seeds and bought a tomato plant (who is taking over the window) to grow some of our own produce this summer.  We know that if nothing else we will have a butt load of Swiss Chard as it has sprouted and is about 4-5 inches tall already.  You can also see that my giant tomato plant has flowered, but he is none too happy with the chilly weather we've been having.  We also planted cucumbers, green beans and sweet peppers.

# 12. I have also started dyeing again.  This is super exciting for me and I can't wait to really dive in and get Alchemy Hour truly set up.

# 27. Another accomplishment is that I might have a summer wardrobe full of hand made and altered items.  I'm going to be participlating in Me Made May '12 and put this to the test and see if I have a complete enough wardrobe to only wear garments I've made or altered for the month of May

Completed:

#17. I have sewn a pair of jeans.  Trouser jeans, but hey they are jeans!

Anita by Burda Style

I was so tickled with the out come of sewing my trouser jeans that I have purchased the Anita pattern from Burda Style and found some great denim with just a touch of crosswise stretch to sew another pair of jeans.  This time skinny jeans.

Failed:
#13. Ok I tried my hand at cooking tofu this month and while I am good at cooking lots of other things I will admit to not having any clue as to how to prepare tofu.  I thought I had figured it out.  I drained and pressed a lot of the liquid out, I used extra firm, and I even seasoned it and seared it in my cast iron pan so it was crispy on the edges.  None of this helped with the weird tofu taste or the spongy center.  I even put it in curry so it would have a fragrant and heavily spiced sauce, but this did nothing for the tofu.  So far the only way I like tofu is deep fried from the Chinese take out place.

For the month of May I am only really planing one thing.  Eve 6 is coming to town and I am going to go see them by hook or by crook.

30 Before 30

I was reading one of my favorite blogs, My Girl Thursday, last month and was super intrigued by her 29 Before 29 project.  This sounded like such a great idea that I decided to give it a try.  I know I got the idea from Thursday, but they say imitation is the greatest form of flattery.

So last month I sat down and figured out that in April there will be 30 months left before I turn 30.  (Wow, that puts it into perspective.)  I also made a list of 30 things I would like to accomplish before I turn 30.  Some of them are easy and I can accomplish them in a month or a week or a day, but others are long term goals.  The idea of having a mix of easy quick goals and long term goals is what makes this project so much fun, and manageable.  (I like making lists and ticking things off as they are completed.)

30 Before 30
1. Go on our Honey Moon (We've been married a year and a half and we still haven't done this)
2. Learn to duck dive
3. Get our apartment in order (We have a lot of crap we need to get rid of and we need to use our space better.)
4. Compete in a Surf Comp at the Shore
5. Turn my Etsy shop into a source of income
6. Open a Roth IRA
7. Get health insurance
8. Pay down my student loan by 6,000 (Right now if I keep paying the amount I am a month I will complete this about a month after I turn 30.)
9. sew a "Chanel" inspired jacket
10. Go to London again
11. Publish a book of knitting patterns
12. Start dyeing yarn (again)
13. Learn to cook tofu well (I swear I am going to figure this one out)
14. Design a cabled cardi
15. Crochet a doily throw
16. Make a picnic quilt
17. Sew a pair of jeans
18. Grow veggies in our windows (This is in progress as I have planted my seeds and have a tomato plant)
19. Lean to can
20. Knit a circular yoke sweater
21. Go fruit picking
22. Go on a road trip with a good friend
23. See Eve 6 (They are coming to Allentown in May)
24. Brew Beer
25. Start Vlogging
26. Learn more about photography/my camera
27. Make a me made wardrobe/stop buying new clothes (I kinda already do this, but I want to actually have a full wardrobe of things I have made or altered.)
28. Go to Vogue Knitting
29. Go to Maryland Sheep and Wool
30. Get a new tattoo

Wish me luck.  I'll be posting my progress over the next 30 months.